Forgotten Memory
by Darren's Wings
Summary: Have I been loyal to Fred's smiling memory? Or have I burned it and washed away the ashes so I can forget and fly with the butterflies? --Ginny reflects.
1. Smile and Laugh

_Ginny's POV. This was written for hondagirl's One Year Challenge. Please review! :) Chapters will be short drabbles. _

_-_

I don't know who I am.

I_ don't_ know who I _am..._

In this one year, just one year since the battle, I still swear that I don't know what it is to smile. I can close my eyes and see Fred's face... Oh, of course, he's laughing. Always. His eyes are lit up and his nose is wrinkled, like it is when he smiles. Laughter was what Fred lived for, and the war was no laughing matter. That's why he died. No more laughter in the world meant no more Fred. No more shining eyes or innocent smiles as a prank is pulled.

How do you smile? What is it like?


	2. Happy Memories

_Hi! I want to thank everyone who reviewed. I'm afraid I don't have time right now to reply, but I promise I will eventually. I also realised I put 'oneshot' in the summary. -headdesk- This will have eight short chapters. Anyway...I'll shut up now. _

_Thanks for reading!_

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Only one year has passed. One year, but a thousand memories. In a few days, Harry and I will be married. Why has he picked our day of happiness to be so close to the day of, one year ago, so many deaths? This is my day, our day, and if we have it now, it will forever be ruined by the memories of the dead. Can't he see that? We should have our _own_ day. One that will never be ruined by anything. We can wait; we have before. So why? In a month, it will be June, and we could have a traditional wedding. Mum would love that. But now all anyone will be able to think about is Fred and his death whenever our wedding anniversary rolls around.

Are death and marriage supposed to be associated? When our anniversary rolls around next year, what will _I _remember—Fred or my wedding?


	3. Fiery Sky

Harry says I have hair like fire. He says I'm beautiful. I'm the most beautiful woman he's ever seen, with my fiery hair and my brown eyes and my square jaw. Every time I cry, he is there to catch each tear. He says they're like raindrops, falling from the deep sky to cleanse the pain of those old memories of Fred's laughter. He says I must cry to take away the pain of those memories from my soul. Fire and rain.

Alone, rain can flood and destroy. You can drown or you can enjoy a nice swim. It can wash away the wreckage of a disaster. Rain is water, the strongest substance on earth, yet the softest. Am I strong?

Alone, fire can burn and kill. But fire can light your way, or you can hold a cheery bonfire with your friends. Fire is chaos and pain, yet it is dancing joy and warmth. It is life and it is death.

Together, rain and fire are enemies; fire turns rain to steam, rain extinguishes fire.

Am I an enemy of myself? Is this why I can't smile—there's nothing to smile for because every smile is countermanded by a guilty frown?

_Thanks, everyone who reviewed!_


	4. Butterflies

Harry always gives me butterflies. I look at him and my stomach flipflops and I can't breathe. Even now that I'm seventeen. I first fell in love with him when I was eleven—can you believe it? I'm no stupid, lovesick schoolgirl (no matter how much I feel like one sometimes) swooning at the first glitter of emerald. I've had my share of boys. Ask Ron; he'll gladly tell you I had too many boyfriends at Hogwarts.

But I still have butterflies around Harry. Every time he touches me, I still feel as if I'm going to faint. Love has never made me so weak, yet around him, I feel so strong. Like the water, but not invincible like the fire.

I wonder if one day all those butterflies will lift me up and fly me away from all these scorched, rained-on memories of laughter. Sometimes, that's all I can hope for.


	5. Surprising Loyalty

Fred's favourite colour was yellow. He must have been nine or ten, but I still remember the day he declared bananas were in for a big surprise. George kept swearing his twin had gone bananas...

Later on, Fred came back from the broom shed with a huge load of the yellow fruit. He began stripping the peels off them and examining every inch of them. Never had he and George done something so stupid-looking, even with the joke shop. They always had this sort of cool nonchalance, as if they were in their own world and everything that was funny was what they wanted to be funny. They ruled humour. Silliness was different, of course, and stupidity, according to them, was for Ron. (He wasn't too happy about that.)

"For heaven's sake, Fred! Why on earth are you making such a mess? You should be ashamed of yourself!" Mum cried, rushing over to him and snatching the half-naked banana out of his hands.

Fred said, "Oh, come on, Mum, I'm just trying to see why they're yellow!" It made sense; when Dad didn't know how a Muggle contraption worked, he took it apart. Fred thought doing the same with bananas was a great idea.

Mum's face was as red as her hair now, and she clenched her fists together and shook them in front of his face. "Why would you want to do such a thing, Fred? Such silly nonsense! This better not be a joke, young man!"

"No," he answered, "I want to know why they are yellow because yellow is the colour of loyalty, and if I can be yellow too, I'll be loyal to everything and everyone."

When he died, his face was yellow. I swear it.

Mum always bought bananas since Fred's death. She was loyal to him.

Have _I_ been loyal to Fred's smiling memory? Or have I burned it and washed away the ashes so I can forget and fly with the butterflies?

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_Please review! Thanks so much. :)_


	6. Conflicting Guilt

There once were scales of balance. They kept order in the world, making us stable and giving us reasons to call ourselves equal to others. They defined our worth, gave us friends and family.

But they tipped, and now George is stranded without his twin on the low end of the scale. He's alone and he's never been alone before. Not ever.

It's only been one year. One person for one year. One year ago, there was one huge conflict that created a war no one would forget. One conflict based on one person's lust for power and one other person's desire to stop the power-hungry man. Harry and Voldemort—one Slytherin, one Gryffindor. One scar. They're balanced. Perfect opposites, yet perfectly alike. Water and fire. Weak and strong.

Sometimes, the scales of balance are easily disrupted. I know; I have done too many wrongs to equal my rights, and I am unbalanced and unstable. How can I live with myself? What kind of person am I? I'm deliberately trying to forget my own brother, for heaven's sake!

Am I a monster?

Fred wouldn't have treated my memory equal to the way I'm treating his, if he had lived and I had died. He was loyal to everything, thanks to bananas. He was loyal to George, to us, to Harry, to the war. To everything he did, and he always kept his promises (unless they too were holey). What am I?

The judge and the scales of balance know who I am, what I am. They have decreed it. This is what I must live with. I know my wrongs, and the judge knows that I deserved my punishment.

The only thing equal to my wrongs is my guilt.

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_This is easily my favourite chapter. _

_Sorry I haven't been updating...long story. Yeah. _

_Anyway, please review! You don't have to have an account. :)_

-Wings-


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